Spider's Lace
by SkullOfRoses
Summary: A kick to the soft inside of her stomach, a gurgle as soft and sweet as birdsong. Hermione knows she would do anything to protect her child. Canon divergence. SSHG, perhaps with a dash of Lumione (LMHG). Short chapters.
1. Chapter 1

Hermione wasn't a very brave girl. She was noble, had a knack for thinking up some ingenious solutions to problems and rolled her eyes when the other girls squealed about a spider. But when it came down to it, she was just a pretender, a sheep in wolf's clothing.

" _What did I tell you?"_ The sound of his hand meeting her soft flesh echoed around the empty hall. Cormac growled with a furious gusto and Hermione cowered against the wall.

All the things she could have said ( _how dare you,_ **leave me alone,** I'll hex you into oblivion) stayed inside her miserable mind. He raised his hand, perhaps to hit her again when a smooth voice stopped Cormac in his tracks.

"Hitting a fellow student? 40 points from Gryffindor."

Snape stood tall, wrapped in his cloak and with a snarl on his lips. His eyebrows were furrowed. His dark irises caught the dim glow of the light that hovered above his head.

His hand shot up and gestured towards the Gryffindor common room, causing the boy standing next to Hermione to begin moving unhappily in that discretion, shooting Hermione furtive glance as he went.

Something was slipped into Hermione's pocket when she walked by the professor.

Upon returning to her bed and drawing the curtains closed, she discovered it to be a small supply of Bruise Removal Paste.


	2. Chapter 2

Hermione raised her wand and stared the DADA professor down. His face was slender with a pointed chin, and that dark shiny hair of his was untrimmed and messy. Respect for each other was obvious in both Snape and Hermione's eyes.

Hermione was proud of herself for lasting this long, especially seeing as she had been ill this morning. Her messy hair was sticking to her forehead and she shot a hex at him. He blocked it (of course) and replied to her spell with a curse of his own.

She raised her shield and took a step back as the burst of a red light hit against it, wincing as it rocked her in place.

She stood up straight, prepared to continue when she spotted Cormac's face in the crowd. He was grinning maliciously, his eyes lighting up with something dark when they met gazes.

The wand slipped from her fingers and the spell Snape had assumed she would rebut hit her full force in the chest, shooting her back.

Realizing she was going to land hard on her stomach, Hermione twisted so her arm took the brunt of the hit instead.

"Move this instant or it will be detention for you all!" Snape snapped.

A hand, cold and clammy, touched her cheek and pried open her eyelid.

Narrowed and covered in shadow, Snape's eyes peered down at her own. "You could have died."

"Yes," she shivered, pulling away. "I know."


	3. Chapter 3

Lying in the hospital bed did nothing to shield her from him. Cormac bit her earlobe affectionately and slid his hand up her neck, caressing her jaw with the tip of his thumb.

Hermione screwed her eyes shut and shook her head, causing her hair to fall over both their faces.

"I was worried, when you fell like that," said Cormac, spitting some of her hair out of his mouth. "For a moment I thought you may have died! How would I have lived if that happened?"

His voice softened. "Who would I make love with then?"

Hermione paled and tugged his hand away from her arm, wincing at how hard he had been pressing his fingernails into her skin.

"I may vomit."

Cormac darted away from her like a shot and clasped his hands behind his back as Severus Snape stared him down. Cormac acted like a preening peacock, but he was nothing more than a cowardly mouse. He wasn't brave, wasn't even good. What was he doing in Gryffindor?

 _What am I doing there?_ Hermione thought miserably. When she looked up, Snape was standing next to her bed and Cormac was gone.

"I trust you are well?"

"Yes, thank you sir." She could not keep the tremble from her voice.

He blinked slowly, like a cat. His head tilted and a curtain of hair framed his sallow skinned face. "I was there when Madam Pomfrey examined you."

Hermione felt her heart drop and she paled considerably, like she might faint.

"I was there when she found not one heartbeat, but two. Tell me, Miss Granger; were you aware that you are carrying a child?"

She threw up all over his shoes.


End file.
